On December 16, search engine giant Google started excluding stories from Spanish news media on its Google News service. The Californian internet company has taken the decision in the wake of the so-called ‘Google tax’, which forms part of the Spanish government’s new Copyright Act, due to go into force on January 1, 2015. The…

Competition and collecting societies: a special application of European legal doctrine in Spain. “It seems to utilise the previous methods in a forced manner, even though those methods had led to very different conclusions on a European level.” In a recent decision by the Spanish Market and Competition Commission (CNMC), once again penalising SGAE with…

On the 1st October 2014, the Copyright and Rights in Performances (Extended Collective Licensing) Regulations 2014 came into force in the UK.1   Licensing bodies and collecting societies already operate within the UK, providing rights management and licensing services for their rightsholder members across a range of sectors including publishing, art and design, music and…

“In addition to the requirement of written form, any transaction or notice aiming at the relinquishment of copyright and thus releasing the work into the public domain further requires the notarization of the written form as a condition of validity.” Under Chapter IV of Law No: 5846 (1) on Intellectual and Artistic Works, the Turkish legal system (2) …

By Kluwer Law International Kluwer Law International is looking for an Associate Editor for the Kluwer Copyright Blog (the blog you are reading now) and for our Landmark EU Copyright Cases project. The Associate Editor will report directly to the editorial team at Kluwer Law International, and will work closely with the Editor-in-chief, Dr. Lucie…

“With the decision in case C-114/12, the Court is now placing emphasis on the hypotheticals by holding that the mere possibility of an international agreement impacting the EU acquis is enough to rule out Member States’ intervention, making the EU exclusively competent to conclude this type of agreement.” On 4 September 2014, the Court of…

“What has not been clarified though is the aspect of unfair competition.” On 21st of October 2014 the Court of Justice of the European Union delivered its order in a preliminary ruling procedure (C-348/13), which was referred to the CJEU by the German Federal Court of Justice (BGH) in May 2013.  As yet, only the…